The Pandemonium Of The Sun

Who would have figured that Pynchon would deliver a book a mere couple of years after his last doorstop. Inherent Vice isn’t exactly a doorstop itself. It is, rather, a relatively easy read (for Pynchon) though I’m not quite sure it’s the “beach read” it’s publishers claim. Set in the surf rock sixties Los Angeles, private investigator Larry “Doc” Sportello is on the hunt for a missing real estate developer. But as with any Pynchon novel, there is so much more going on. In the small selection of books that Pynchon has published, this is a fairly minor, although still entertaining novel. It’s probably not a great place to start, if you haven’t read any Pynchon. I hate it when Pynchon newbies ask me where to start with the condition that they don’t want to start with Gravity’s Rainbow. If you start with something like this, it’s just going to give you the wrong idea about Pynchon as a whole. If you’ve read Pynchon before, it’s definitely recommended.